Why, It's So Simple!
by Milady Montrose
Summary: Homeworld is in the middle of a resource crisis. White Diamond can no longer go out and conquer as she wishes. After thinking long and hard about it, White Diamond realizes that the creatures she conquers are valuable too.


Written really quickly to scratch the writer's itch.

If you came from a story called Blue Zircon Ace Attorney, the WD in here is totally different. Probably out of character, too.

Well, whatever, it was fun to write.

(o_ _)ﾉ彡

A being can exist only as long as it has material to feed upon. Without sustenance, the being will devour itself in the quest to prolong its existence. Without the proper sustenance, a being will remain as a stone in mud-unchanging, yet alive.

Gemkind required very little base sustenance. The blazing stars and suns of many light years away fulfilled their basic needs. In the beginning, Gemkind needed this only to subsist and conquer the universe around them.

What a glorious expansion it had been! Blue Diamond regulated life at home, Yellow Diamond supplied the technological might, and White Diamond lorded over it all, orchestrating what surely must have been the universe's greatest rout. Gems leapfrogged across the galaxy, crushing entire worlds and dissidents, retooling them for their prime directive. No one (barring a few irritants) could resist the Gems' collective might. The Archaeans, the Polymorphs, the Ixians, the Pyroxenes, the Aegirines… the list of fallen worlds stretched on for miles.

The innovation fueling this rapid expansion, a Gemkind specialty: the complete deconstruction and use of all available resources on a planet, reducing it to a lifeless husk.

At some past point in time, the materials needed to sustain and expand Gemkind's empire surpassed their productivity. Growth had stalled, bringing White Diamond to her present dilemma.

She set her massive intellect to the task. How could Gemkind resume their quest as soon as possible? A new energy source must be found, or their existing systems must become more efficient.

She identified upkeep and maintenance of existing infrastructure as a large player in this deficit. Much of their groundwork had been built eons ago, requiring expensive, regular maintenance. White Diamond could not simply order this to be removed; a being without legs could not walk. And upgrading the system…? Well, everything from the ground up would have to be overhauled.

Often, spaceship control center had been built decades ago, from old technology. The spaceships themselves, new technology, had been retrofitted for compatibility with the old technology. To replace the old with the new would require another retrofitting; this time, to enable the comparatively older spaceships with the newer network.

Ah, Yellow Diamond would handle this. (She should have done all this before; it was lax of Yellow to let this technological crunch happen.)

White Diamond set her mind towards the prisoners-of-war and the inhabitants of the planets they had destroyed. Blue Diamond headed this front: her policy dictated that these lower life-forms would be resettled within select spaces of Gem Society, forbidden to reproduce, so they would naturally go extinct within a reasonable timeframe. Upkeep of these societies took too much time, energy and resources.

White Diamond tilted her head a little. Billions of these worthless creatures Homeworld housed, deep underneath the surface of their planet; each of them used up priceless resources, but themselves contained priceless resources. Would Blue Diamond consent to deconstruction of these sentient creatures, for the greater good?

 _"As higher life forms, it is our duty to contain these creatures and allow them to live out the rest of their lesser lives. True, they do contain valuable resources, but these can be harvested from their bodies after they die. It is not necessary to defile ourselves by killing them in such a manner."_

And Pink Diamond would raise a massive fuss.

 _"White Diamond! How could you suggest such a thing? If you really want to use them, do so after they die! It is too cruel to kill these creatures-they are sentient, and can feel pain!."_

White Diamond could overrule Blue Diamond, but never had she actually done so. It would not be prudent to sow discord within the Diamonds' ranks.

Still, she did not need to notify either Diamond to confiscate the dead bodies and put them to a higher purpose. Leaning forward, White Diamond spoke down to her White Pearl.

"Enact a new Directive, Pearl."

"Yes, My Diamond."

White Diamond spoke her will, and guidelines for enacting it.

 _From now on, the bodies of the conquered peoples would be recycled. Those already died and buried according to their society's wishes would be removed from their resting places, and recycled as well._

 _For hard bodied organisms, freeze them and shatter them. Place within a grinder and homogenize the material. Extract appropriate minerals._

 _For soft bodied organisms, these should be sliced, and sectioned into these categories: bones, soft tissue, organs, and protuberances._

 _Bones often contained calcium, silicon, or phosphates; slice open the creature and remove all the bones. Grind them up, and extract the material._

 _Soft tissue contained a wealth of trace minerals (iron, tin, manganese, chlorine, cobalt, copper…) and a slew of carbon compounds. Remove the tissue, grind it, and homogenize it. Lyse the tissue, and centrifuge it in stages, removing the pellet of material at the bottom at each stage. Extract and purify the necessary material._

 _Hair, nails, fibers, flagella, and various such protuberances could be sliced from the main body, and ground up. Often, proteins of various kinds composed the bulk of the protuberance; extract these._

 _Soft organs contained mostly carbon and trace minerals. Liquefy these and extract according to prior techniques._

And so on...

* * *

White Pearl listened to her Diamond's dictate, wrote it up, and had sent it for immediate enforcement.


End file.
